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Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

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Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#391

Post by shadowgovt »

MrDrMcCoy wrote: post #323
nox101 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Without Google subsidizing Chrome, a real competitive market for browsers might emerge Without Chrome there will be only be Safari and Edge

I don't that Edge would survive without Chrome. I think it would be more fair to say that without Chrome, there will only be Safari, Firefox, Ladybird, and Verso. Yes, the latter two aren't ready yet, but I get they would gain fast traction in Chrome's absence.

An unfortunate additional consequence of this antitrust lawsuit is that it is likely it will end The Google payments to Mozilla every year. That's 80% of the revenue, so the odds of them being a viable business afterwards are low.

So I think we can cross that off the list as well and conclude that in the short to medium term, if Chrome went away it would mean simple web hegemony for Apple.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#393

Post by cogman10 »

sushid wrote: post #368
cogman10 wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because people choose to use it. Incorrect. Google spent ungodly amounts of money to make sure that their search engine was the default in as many places as possible. People didn't "choose" to use it, they use the defaults. And in some cases, like my Android phone, google is the only option for integrated searches. I cannot use another search engine without opening a browser then opening up the search engine of cho…

You are literally agreeing with the parent commenter. It's anticompetitive but not a monopoly. The parent is also talking about Chrome, not Google Search.

I never said I disagreed with their entire comment, I was responding to the statements saying "switching search engines is easy and google is obviously the superior product that's why it's used instead of bing.com".

That should have been clear from my comment and if you look at other comments in this thread you'll see others interpreted the parent comment similarly.

I suggest you read others comments more charitably.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#394

Post by __loam »

georgeecollins wrote: post #347
missedthecue wrote: post #334

I think we need a better term than monopoly, that separates it from what people usually mean which is 'the best product'. I literally cannot think of any sort of product or service with lower switching costs than internet search. Typing bing.com takes 0.8 seconds and costs $0. Hundreds of orders of magnitude easier than switching to a different railroad if only one goes through your town. Google is a big ass company…

Just have to say this again even if everyone already knows it: If the US Government / EU hadn't threatened Microsoft they would have embedded their browser in Windows and tied it to the OS to the extent where normal people would only use their browser. I don't know if Google could exist in that alternate world, but I suspect Microsoft would have "deprived them of Oxygen" and they would be bought or crushed. You proba…

Google is so critically important to the infrastructure of the internet itself that I really struggle to understand why a for profit entity with incentives that are not aligned to the public should be in charge of the most important search engine.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#395

Post by schott12521 »

bdw5204 wrote: post #336

With search, there are actually 2 different products. The index itself is a textbook natural monopoly. There's no upside in having more than 1 web crawler as long as it can be trusted to just crawl the web but there's plenty of downside in the form of increased bandwidth costs for web sites. The actual search rankings are where competition makes sense. So spin the Google search index off as a non-profit that makes it…

I can't begin to imagine what this world would look like, but I can keep dreaming...

I think splitting up Maps from Google/Apple would make OpenStreetMaps see a lot more usage and improvements.

Amazon Shopping should absolutely be split into an online store and a logistics company.

I'd like to see something even more radical when splitting up Infrastructure (AWS / GCP / Azure), such as the Government offering Infrastructure similar to the Postal Service, effectively turning AWS / GCP / Azure into Fedex / UPS.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#397

Post by ratorx »

cogman10 wrote: post #365
kajecounterhack wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the index itself should be something operated by the public rather than privately I love this but the act of indexing the web is both complex and ever-evolving (not to mention expensive), so the market needs to have natural incentives for the public crawler to continue being good at its job. Google is incentivized to have a great index because it feeds into its competitive advantage. If the index is a shared resour…

> what incentive does the indexing company have to keep improving it? A publicly owned asset doesn't need to be managed by a private entity. The incentive can be exactly the same incentive that the NHS and NASA operate on. It's a fun problem that you can make a career on making better that is ultimately a public good. Not everything needs to be operated with pure profits in mind. > And what guarantees that the indexi…

NHS is a pretty terrible example. Since it relies on public funding without a direct monetary profit, it is an easy target for defunding when the government needs to cut expenses. And lo and behold that is exactly what has happened.

I’m not saying privatisation is better (US healthcare is the textbook counter-example), but just wanted to make the point that socialising something has demonstrably not been a good way to drive innovation and improvement in some cases.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#398

Post by b112 »

somastoma wrote: post #358
b112 wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one pays $0. All that slurping of user data is used by other corps to maximize their profits. They're paying for that data, and then believe they're making more from consumers as a result. But no matter what, the cost of collecting that data, the infra, and then corp x or y buying it, comes out of the bottom line. It's like points credit cards. Where does that cash back come from, magical fairies? It comes from re…

well, I know that the free cash I get IS from fairies. Yours doesn't?

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Looking at your current user's post history, you've posted gibberish as comments (just random text). You then progressed to posting a personal history multiple times, where you lambasted the users of this forum, essentially calling everyone "mean" and implying foul intent. Attacks like this are against the guidelines, and really, I cannot imagine they'd go over well anywhere.

Most of your posts seem to be non-thoughtful posts (see the guidelines), which contribute little such as this one. We all go off the rails a bit from time to time, we all colour outside the lines occasionally, but it seems like most of your posts are outside of the lines.

If you really want to engage in thoughtful debate, at least on HN, I suggest you read the guidelines again, and at least attempt to post in the spirit much of the time. Again, no one is going to be perfect in this, but from what I see it doesn't seem like you really want to engage thoughtfully.

Good luck.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#399

Post by is_true »

blitzar wrote: post #41
is_true wrote: post #6

I think Google can win this easily by using the public opinion against the regulators. They just need to say that they are gonna start charging for all their services because without the level of integration they have it doesn't make sense to keep running businesses that otherwise would lose money.

Google would need to get public opinion on their side first.

They already have that.

Re: Google is a monopoly – the fix isn't obvious

#400

Post by Red_Leaves_Flyy »

chipdart wrote: post #254
Red_Leaves_Flyy wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The housing and finance markets seem like a fitting example. Under and over investment respectively fueled bubbles that fed each other until their inevitable pop took the entire economy down and required a decade of artificially suppressed rates backed by trillions in debt setting us for bigger problems when an actual economic crisis occurs (Covid). We’re still weathering this storm of financial mismanagement on a na…

> artificially suppressed rates I don't follow your point. All rates are set arbitrarily according to the monetary policy followed on any specific moment. What leads you to believe that arbitrarily setting a rate one way is natural, but arbitrarily setting it another way is more natural? > Zooming back out, whatever pain comes from breaking Google up today will be less than the pain of doing so in a decade. Will it,…

This is an active area of debate and research among economists - of which I am not. That said, looks like you have some homework to do.

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-hutchins-center-expla...

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